’90s Heartthrob Devon Sawa’s Career May Not Be As Dead As We Thought It Was

The original title for this article was going to be “What The Hell Happened To Devon Sawa‘s Career?” When we noticed that the adorable boy we crushed on in the ’90s was turning 34 today and we didn’t automatically know what he’s been up to, we figured that he was one of those child stars who’d drifted into obscurity. I was even prepared to pull from Jonathan Taylor Thomas – Devon’s arguably more famous contemporary, whose birthday is tomorrow — and offer Devon some tips on how to become relevant again.

Then I started researching Devon, and realized he’s doing quite well for himself! First, let me jog your memory. It may be that among the crop of ’90s heartthrobs including Andrew Keegan, Brad Renfro, and Rider Strong, you don’t even remember Devon. He was definitely among the more low-key of the bunch, getting his Tiger Beat profiles but best known for playing the human Casper opposite Christina Ricci in Casper.

For the rest of the decade, his biggest project was Now and Then; and when he was cast in the first Final Destination movie in 2000, it made sense because he was growing up alongside his contemporaries. And then, you know, getting brutally murdered by Death. But while he consistently worked nearly every year after that, none of his subsequent roles were as mainstream. Now he looks like this:

So yes, Devon, the answer to your question is “yes.” To what can we owe Devon’s sudden resurgence of popularity? For the past year or so he’s had a recurring role on The CW’s action show Nikita, which interestingly enough also revived Shane West‘s career. His character Owen Elliott is an operative who fell in love with a civilian and saw her murdered, only to realize that he was responsible for killing Nikita’s fiance earlier in the series. He’s currently filming season 3 and posts funny photos from the set:

Aren’t he and Shane kinda adorable? Tumblr certainly thinks so. So for the time being, Devon’s got things handled. He’s a beloved character on a surprise hit show, he has a great working relationship with his co-stars, and now the new social media generation makes .gifs of him. Looks like JTT is the one who could use some pointers.